What Tree Is That?—and Why?

Tree City USA Bulletin #53—Sources for More Information

Order your copy of What Tree Is That?, the award-winning key to identifying North American trees described in Tree City USA Bulletin #53.

Once you identify a tree, you will want more information about it. There are many excellent books to help, but here are some to consider:

Manual of Woody Landscape Plants by Michael A. Dirr
Native Trees for North American Landscapes by Guy Sternberg with Jim Wilson.
The Sibley Guide to Trees by David Allen Sibley.
Trees of North America: A Guide to Field Identification by C. Frank Brockman and Rebecca Marrilees.

Please remember: All book purchases made through our arborday.org link to Amazon.com, returns a portion of the sale price to the Arbor Day Foundation to support its educational programs in tree planting and environmental stewardship. Simply go to the Arbor Day Online Books section of this site.

More details on plant structure, especially leaf cells, can be found in the Online Biology Book.
The Online Biology Book is also a good place to look to gain a better understanding of flower parts and their functions.
An excellent discussion about the benefits of leaf litter has been published in Grounds Maintenance Magazine. Read the article, “When Leaves Turn into Litter” by Thomas A. Nikolai of Michigan State University online.
The amazing world of lichens is nicely introduced at the University of California Museum of Paleontology’s website. For great photos of these plants that often make their homes on trees, see The Lichens of North America.
More on the benefits provided by trees can be found at numerous Web sites, but here are two excellent starting points: Benefits of Trees in Urban Areas and Center for Urban Forest Research.

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